Miami Made Festival Returns To The Arsht Center (PHOTOS)

“You think about New York, Chicago, L.A., as places where new work is created, but really, I believe that Miami-based artists are creating some of the most exciting art anywhere in the country,” says the Arsht Center’s executive vice president, Scott Shiller, who’s been involved with this week's Miami Made Festival since its inception.

Through March 3, the Miami Made Festival 2013 features a week-long plethora of events that include, free of charge, staged play readings, pop-up performances, and a dance showcase.

This year the focus is on Cuban-American Letty Bassart, a choreographer, dancer, and writer who in a previous life was a hospice nurse and an epidemiologist.

“It’s so powerful to be able to show your work in a place where there’s a certain level of production and support in terms of resources, and it’s really interesting too that this particular support comes for a work that has been seen in a very raw kind of state, and that they’re willing to invest in its growth,” says the Miami native. “That is so rare.”

“Miami Made Festival is a step further, not just a launch of these ideas as a work in progress, but it’s also the recognition of the development of these ideas, which is incredibly humbling,” says the 2012 Knight Arts Challenge grant recipient.

For Bassart and her Miami Made Festival colleagues, more good news may be on the way.

“This year’s festival really represents sort of a new commitment to the Miami Made program,” says Shiller. “Out of all of the projects that are being done this year, the Arsht Center will likely produce some, if not all of these, as fully developed works in our future seasons.”

Along with the Good, God, Go, other highlights include:
Pop-Up Performance: Extended Stay from the Project [Theatre], in the style of reality TV, Feb. 26 & 27 at 9:00 p.m. at the Riviera South Beach Hotel, 2000 Liberty Ave., Miami Beach.

Staged Play Reading: Fear Up Harsh, based on a military phrase that refers to “enhanced interrogation,” Feb. 28 at 7:30 p.m. at the Carnival Studio Theater, Arsht Center.

Staged Play Reading: Two-Merz, dark comedy about brothers with cancer, March 3 at 4:00 p.m. at the Carnival Studio Theater, Arsht Center.